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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22698928">Splintered</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/jellybeanforest/pseuds/jellybeanforest'>jellybeanforest</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst with a Hopeful Ending, Canon Divergence, Darkfic, Despair, Fix-It, Grief, M/M, Missing Scenes, No Smut, Past Peggy Carter/Steve Rogers, Past Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Rated for Graphic Nightmares, Remix, Sacrifice, Sort Of, Soul Realm, Trauma, holy shit what's happened to Tony?, post-Avengers: Endgame, survivor's guilt, waking nightmares</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 11:14:11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>9,029</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22698928</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/jellybeanforest/pseuds/jellybeanforest</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Following the events of Endgame, Tony’s soul is in torment. Fractured across time and space as a result of the snap, he is doomed to relive his failures, his shortcomings and traumas, in a terrifying limbo, flitting unpredictably between different planes of existence. Natasha does her best to hold the pieces together as he crumbles, but only one thing can mend his tattered self and make Tony whole again: an undamaged template – the other half of his soul.</p><p>Meanwhile, in the land of the living, Steve struggles with Tony’s death, plagued by missed opportunities, lingering what-if’s, and guilt. The Avengers send him on a final mission where he has one last chance to make it right. </p><p>Remix of “This Terribly Tempered Soul” by Padraigen for the 2020 Cap-IronMan Remix Exchange.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>James "Bucky" Barnes &amp; Steve Rogers, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>109</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>2020 Captain America/Iron Man Remix Exchange</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Splintered</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Padraigen/gifts">Padraigen</a>.</li>


        <li>
            Inspired by

            <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/20864810">This Terribly Tempered Soul</a> by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Padraigen/pseuds/Padraigen">Padraigen</a>.
        </li>

    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I know the Tesseract in the MCU is literally the space stone, but it’s also (popularly in A Wrinkle in Time and Interstellar) a representation of the fifth dimension and is commonly depicted as a hypercube. (The way a cube is to a square, the tesseract or hypercube is to the cube.) The tesseract is essentially where all of time is happening at once.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Steve is the one who carries him off the battlefield.</p><p>Tony is pale and broken, smelling of burnt flesh and sweat and ozone. The kid is wailing, large snot bubbles forming and bursting down his reddened face. Pepper is not much better as Rhodey holds her tight, patting her back and lightly shushing her. Rhodey is a soldier; he has lost people before, but the death of his best friend has left him bereft as well, and he buries his grief in Pepper’s shoulder. Steve wonders if the salt will rust her armor. Probably not. Tony designed the suit to withstand all environments. He is – <em>was, </em>Steve reminds himself – conscientious like that.</p><p>Steve swallows the lump forming in his throat and then the next. If he can concentrate on the task at hand, on putting one foot in front of the other, concerning himself with the small steps instead of the large what-comes-next, then maybe he won’t break down, but Tony…</p><p>
  <em>Tony.</em>
</p><p>Rhodey had been the one to close his eyes after, but they don’t stay that way, slitting open along the bottom seam, his dark irises, not yet milky, barely peaking through thick lashes. He weighs less than Steve had anticipated, even with the armor, but that isn’t surprising. In life, Tony had been so large, his personality boisterous and overwhelming, barely contained within his mortal coil, and now that he’s gone...</p><p>It’s no surprise that what remains feels somewhat diminished.</p><p>Steve wishes Tony was still alive.</p><p>He wishes they had had more time. There is so much he wants to say to Tony, and now? Now it is too late.</p><p>He wishes he hadn’t been such a coward.</p><p>He wishes–</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>–He had a drink.</p><p>Perhaps then Tony could collect his wits and figure out what he’s seeing. He doesn’t quite remember how he got here. Well, to be more exact, he remembers, but he doesn’t understand the sequence of events.</p><p>He recalls the burn, the white-hot fire radiating from his right arm, infecting his torso, crawling up his neck and down his leg. Pain that would cripple a lesser man, should have consumed him, brought him to his knees, but Tony had thought of Morgan, of Pepper and Rhodey.</p><p>
  <em>Steve.</em>
</p><p>He needed to finish it for all of them, so he straightened out his tensed fingers, pressed thumb to middle and–</p><p>
  <em>Why is he not dead?</em>
</p><p>Instead, the gauntlet transported him to an alien planet, a barren world where the sky is reddish-orange and the landscape near featureless, with a sparse tree here and there and beside him the – Is that his home by the lake? The skin on the right side of his face tugs when he tries to work his jaw, seemingly too-tight and near pinched. It’s dead silent. He can’t hear the sound of an errant breeze rustling the few trees there are, the whirr of his armor…</p><p>His own breath.</p><p>He isn’t breathing, he realizes as he frantically sucks in a deep yawning gasp and coughs out a death rattle. Tony can’t breathe.</p><p>…He doesn’t need to, he soon understands. Because he is dead, and this is his own personal–</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>“…hell if I know,” Steve replies. Bruce had extracted the stones from the gauntlet to be placed in a stabilizing case. He had given the empty shell to Steve, thinking perhaps it will help.</p><p>It doesn’t.</p><p>Bucky clasps a comforting hand on his shoulder. “If you need to talk–”</p><p>“I’m fine, Bucky,” Steve says, but he must not be particularly convincing, because in the next moment, Bucky is holding him tight, and tears are falling down his face. Steve weeps, and the sound of his anguish, muffled by Bucky’s shoulder, are fit for a wounded animal. He drops the gauntlet completely to return the embrace. The resultant ring as it hits the ground is deep and hollow, like Steve himself.</p><p>“It’s okay,” Bucky is murmuring into his hair. “Everything is gonna be okay.”</p><p>“How?” Steve manages, his throat raw. “How is anything ever going to be okay again?”</p><p>“You’ll get through it. There are people here who love you and need you. I love you, Stevie. I love you, and I need you to stay for me, okay? You need to stay.”</p><p>It’s not fair. Bucky can’t ask that of Steve.</p><p>He tells him as much.</p><p>“Yes, I’m being selfish, Stevie, because I can’t lose you, too. We’ve lost everything, but we can get through this together, you and me. We can do this.”</p><p>Steve sobs, tears soaking through Bucky’s shirt like–</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Blood.</p><p>There are dead bodies piled high. Men, women, and children – their bodies twisted together, smashed under heavy debris and torn asunder, their blood drained, sluggish and clotted, and standing knee high. Tony can’t get out of it. He would have to crawl up the pile to even have a chance, but the bodies are rotted and pull away like putty and their faces–</p><p>Their faces stare back at him, tormented and accusing.</p><p>
  <em>You did this.</em>
</p><p>Collateral damage.</p><p>From the Chitauri invasion, from Sokovia and all their missions. All of them had been labeled a success, every last one of them.</p><p>
  <em>Look upon all that you have wrought…</em>
</p><p>Tony can’t look away. There’s a young girl that might have looked like Morgan in the pile, partially shielded by her mother, their bodies pressed together and putrified, so it is hard to say where one ended and the other began.</p><p>
  <em>…And despair.</em>
</p><p>He falls into the muck and blood. It bleeds through the cracks of his armor and splashes up against his face and dripping slippery-wet down his neck, staining the collar of his white shirt. And the smell– It’s heavy with iron and death. He would gag if he still had breath.</p><p>Why has he never realized how much blood stinks of–</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>…iron Man.</p><p>That’s what Tony had said. The last words Steve heard through the comms.</p><p>
  <em>I am Iron Man.</em>
</p><p>He can’t go into the house. Tony’s last message is for Pepper and Morgan, Happy and Rhodey. <em>His family.</em> And that hasn’t included Steve, not for several years, not since that fateful day in a Siberian bunker, not since Tony stumbled out of that space craft, lost and desperately frail, and told Steve in no uncertain terms to shove it. Sure, he liked to think they made up in the end…</p><p>(<em>Resentment is corrosive, and I hate it,</em> Tony had told him, just before he had given him back his father’s shield.)</p><p>But Steve doesn’t belong here. He should go. He retreats towards the front of the house, calculating how long it will take him to run back to the compound on foot. He can catch up with Sam and Bucky later, after he’s gone anywhere but here.</p><p>A delicate hand falls on his upper arm. “Steve, I’m happy to see you here,” Pepper – Tony’s wife, his <em>widow</em> – says, her voice tinged with sorrow.</p><p>“I’m sorry for your loss. Tony is – was – a good man. Earth’s greatest defender.” It’s the standard line. Doesn’t make it any less true. Both the epithet and the sentiment behind it. “He will be greatly missed.”</p><p><em>I’ll miss him,</em> because Tony is gone, but Steve is not, and he’s so tired of surviving, of outliving everyone he’s ever–</p><p>“Do you have a minute? I don’t want to keep you long, but…” she’s not tugging on his arm per se, but she clearly wants him to follow.</p><p>“Of course,” Steve replies, allowing Pepper to lead him into the study. He is not about to deny her anything, not today, not ever.</p><p>“Tony… Well, you know Tony was a passionate man,” she begins, rifling through a drawer, searching for something. Tony’s death must have unmoored Pepper for her to be so disorganized. “When he loved someone, he put that person at the center of his world, and it’s as if the sun rises and sets with them. It was intense, his love and affection. Overwhelming at times, even.” She opens a second drawer.</p><p>“Tony never did things by halves,” Steve states. It was what he both hated and loved about the man.</p><p>“No, I suppose not,” Pepper agrees, suspending her search. She bites her lip and looks past Steve, at a fixed point over his shoulder as she adds, “He also didn’t do secrets either, not from me.”</p><p>“…Oh,” and what is there left to say; what defense can he offer?</p><p>
  <em>This was a mistake.</em>
</p><p>And so he fumbles, “Pepper, you have to know Tony loved you. He–”</p><p>“It’s alright, Steve. We weren’t together at the time. You don’t have to explain anything,” she says so graciously Steve can barely stand it.</p><p>“I should go.” He never should have come. Morgan lost her father, Pepper lost her husband, and what did Steve lose?</p><p><em>You’re going to be the death of me,</em> Tony had said, sheet wrapped around his waist, hair sleep-rumpled and voice raspy but teasing.</p><p>Who was Steve to stand here, feeling sorry for himself, wishing that things could have been different? Who was he to feel like this when Tony’s <em>actual</em> family had suffered incalculably greater losses?</p><p>But Pepper isn’t done. “Steve. Really, it’s okay. I just… I wanted to give you this,” She withdraws a small rectangular device and holds it out for Steve. It isn’t the Iron Man helmet Tony had gifted his family, but there’s an on/off switch and play, rewind, fast-forward buttons on the side. It’s an interface Steve could easily figure out without help, though he suspects that is why Tony chose it. “It had your name on it, and– and he wanted you to have it.” Sure enough, plastered on the top is a piece of masking tape with <em>STEVE</em> written in big block letters.</p><p>Steve accepts it, turning it over in his hands. “…What does it say?”</p><p>“I don’t know. It’s not for me,” Pepper replies, her eyes soft and sad, “but if I were to guess… Steve. The opposite of love isn’t hate; it isn’t resentment. It’s indifference. And Tony was never indifferent where you were concerned.”</p><p>“Pepper, I’m sorry–”</p><p>But she pats his arm, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “Don’t be. Not about this. Not today, okay?”</p><p>And now she’s embracing him, clinging to the man her husband might have loved. Once upon a time. Steve doesn’t know how to feel about that, so he holds her as she crumbles, muffling racking sobs into his suit jacket.</p><p><em>Are those tears for me, Miss Potts?</em> he imagines Tony saying. <em>Your eyeliner is–</em></p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Running into a dead-end, Tony swiftly backtracks and takes off in another direction(s). He may be a genius, but he is still just a man in a can, able to perceive and experience the first four dimensions, but this… falling or gliding or collapse-imploding through a cube within a cube within a cube, strings drawn taut, connecting time and space at all instances, it’s too much, too disorienting and confusing. It’s tearing him – his body, his history, his sanity, his very soul – to pieces.</p><p>Howard is yelling at him, the disappointment in his voice amplified and distorted by his third drink, and Tony is cowering, small and scared, in his seat at the dinner table. Mom is trying to calm Howard down, pointing out that they are not alone, that Jarvis and Anna are still in the room, but the man never cared for witnesses when he’d had a few.</p><p><em>My son is not soft,</em> he says. <em>Stark men are made of iron.</em></p><p>Besides, Tony always had Uncle Obie. Uncle Obie who snuck him issues of <em>Playboy</em> amidst the stack of <em>Forbes</em> and <em>Popular Mechanics</em> magazines, who let him smoke his first cigar at 14 when Howard had been too busy with his projects to pay attention to whatever his son was doing…</p><p>Uncle Obie who sold Stark weapons to terrorists under Tony’s very nose and tried to have him murdered.</p><p>
  <em>Welcome, Tony Stark, the most famous mass murderer in the history of America.</em>
</p><p>The cave, the car battery, the gaping wound in his chest, deep and dark. Uncle Obie’s hand inside, squeezing the life out of him as his skin goes pale and clammy.</p><p>
  <em>Look, what you just saw, that is your legacy, Stark.</em>
</p><p>Less than a week to live and still so much work left to be done.</p><p>
  <em>You’re a man who has everything and nothing.</em>
</p><p>There are whispers, rising in volume and washing over Tony in a wave of white noise. He plugs his ears, curls inward, but the tide is relentless, like the fritz and drone of a broken television as the pitch and volume rise. Too many voices – laughing, talking, shouting – mostly indistinguishable, but he thinks he hears Natasha’s coming through.</p><p>“Tony! Tony stay with me!”</p><p>There’s a brush of fingers through his hair, enough to startle him, but when he turns, spinning out in all directions, the source is gone, and–</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>He is alone now.</p><p>Steve had made sure of it. He lays across the twin bed in his studio apartment on the meaner side of Brooklyn, palming the recorder Pepper had given him, turning it over to look at the device from all angles. It’s clunky and old, not really Tony’s style, but he supposes he didn’t warrant one of Tony’s inventions. Or perhaps the kinder (and more likely) explanation had been his first instinct: Tony wanted Steve to listen to this alone, and to accomplish that, it couldn’t be too fancy.</p><p>There is some resistance in the buttons when pressed. Steve can’t plausibly claim (even to himself) that he accidentally played the tape. He will need to push down and follow through, to make a conscious decision. But did he want to? When did Tony record this anyway? Shortly before the Time Heist when he had more or less chosen to forgive Steve, or shortly after the snap when he was still reeling from the death of Peter and half the population of the universe? Tony had placed the blame squarely on Steve’s shoulders for that fiasco, not that Steve blamed him.</p><p>He still remembers Tony, emaciated and barely standing, using his IV scaffolding as a crutch.</p><p>
  <em>I got nothing for you, Cap! I got no coordinates, no clues, no strategies, no options. Zero. Zip. Nada. No trust. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Liar.</em>
</p><p>Or had he made this even earlier still – after Siberia even – when Tony had looked at him, his eyes large and disbelieving.</p><p>
  <em>Did you know?</em>
</p><p>The “Play” button makes a satisfying click when pressed.</p><p>“If you’re listening to this, Cap, then I haven’t destroyed it. You made it. You survived, and I… didn’t,” Tony’s voice filters through, confident despite the hint of indecision. “I really hope the others lived, too. After what happened with Natasha...” he hesitates, coughs then tries again, “I hope you know there are people who love you and– and I just wanted to tell you… Don’t waste it. Your life. You saw the lake house, hm? What did you think? Pepper and me and Morgan and Greg the Alpaca. I know it’s not the dog we had talked about at Clint’s farmhouse back when…” he pauses, takes a deep breath and exhales, producing a rustling sound on the audio. “I haven’t thought about that for so long, you know, and now it’s all I can think about. You and me. The farmhouse. The simple life, you know?”</p><p>Steve imagines Tony recording this, perhaps in his study, looking out the window at Morgan and Pepper playing in the front yard, that life Tony had made for himself in Steve’s absence, in his exile.</p><p>“We never talked about kids. I’m not sure if you never wanted any, or you just didn’t want any with me. Perhaps you never thought about having that for yourself, never allowed yourself to think about living past the next day, the next week or month. Maybe it was too painful after Peggy. I don’t know, but Cap… Steve…” he amends, “Having Morgan is the single greatest decision me and Pep have ever made. It’s indescribable. Words fails me, and you know how rare that is.”</p><p>He imagines Tony leaning atop his desk, arms crossed with one hand raised to pinch the bridge of his nose between closed eyes. “The last five years have been some of the best years of my life, the happiest since…well…” Another note of hesitation. <em>How long did it take Tony to record this? How many times did he have to start over to get a clean cut of what he wanted to say to Steve?</em></p><p>“I just wanted you to know that you can have this, too, if you let yourself. It’s what I always wanted for you, and if you’re listening to this, there’s still time for you yet. So… Put down the shield. Make a home. Be happy. You deserve it, Steve, and I hope that if we see each other again, on the other side, you can tell me honestly that you have no regrets,” he finishes.</p><p>Steve swallows the lump in his throat and drapes his arm over the line of his closed eyes to catch any errant tears as the tape falls silent, ending five minutes later with an audible click.</p><p>He hits rewind.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>It’s his life on loop, with special attention to the low lights, a replay of his worst impulses, his gravest sins and transgressions.</p><p><em>You’ve got to let go. You’ve got to let go. I’ll catch you, I promise,</em> Tony had said, his arm outstretched, trying to reach the woman he loves. The scaffolding groans and collapses.</p><p>Pepper falls right through his fingers into the flames below.</p><p>Another lie to add to the list.</p><p><em>My body literally cannot handle the stress,</em> she had screamed at him. <em>I never know if you’re gonna kill yourself or wreck the whole company.</em></p><p>Tony seizes, the scene glitches around him, and now he’s in Sokovia. Pietro Maximoff is dead, but Wanda isn’t. She’s bereft, inconsolable, the red whips of her destructive power radiating outward.</p><p><em>They don’t grant visas to weapons of mass destruction,</em> Tony had said.</p><p><em>She’s a kid!</em> Steve had argued. He had been about to sign, because he trusted Tony, trusted that his heart was in the right place, but his cavalier attitude towards the individual (one many of the Avengers weren’t particularly fond of) to preserve the group had been the death knell to any negotiation. Tony had been angry with him. Steve could be so short-sighted, he had thought. He couldn’t see that Tony had made necessary concessions to try to keep the Avengers together so they would be prepared for the worst, the external threat just over the horizon, but his disagreement with Steve had only served to tear them apart.</p><p>To tear him and Steve apart.</p><p>“Tony! Slow down!” Natasha’s voice calls out. “I can’t find you if you don’t–“</p><p>“If they’re sleeping here, some of them are gonna have to double up,” Laura Barton’s voice breaks through.</p><p>Tony’s eyes roll back, and he falls into a pile of fresh linens. The sun is filtering through the window, illuminating the bedroom he and Steve had shared at the Barton family farm before the end, when they still had a chance to be something more than whatever they were pretending not to be. Tony thinks that maybe the end had always been inevitable. Perhaps this moment was just an ephemeral respite, the eye of a hurricane of heartbreak and recrimination. But if Tony is wrong about the inevitability of the end, if there truly had been a time he and Steve could have avoided the collision course towards all-out war, it had been here in this moment.</p><p>They just missed their window of opportunity.</p><p>“Sweetheart, we should get up,” Steve murmurs into Tony’s hair. He wraps an arm around low around Tony’s nude body lying halfway on Steve’s own to gently caress his hip.</p><p>Tony lets out a soft huff of complaint. “Don’t wanna,” he mumbles, refusing to open his eyes or acknowledge the morning sun.</p><p>“The others will get suspicious.”</p><p>“Don’t care.”</p><p>Steve lifts his lover’s body up slightly to shimmy out from under him.</p><p>One eye slits open, just barely, before closing again and groaning. “Where do you think you’re going?”</p><p>“To put on a pot of coffee if Nat hasn’t beat me to it,” he says, planting a kiss on Tony’s temple. “You’re welcome to join the rest of us in the land of the living whenever you’re ready.”</p><p>“Kiss before you go?” and how could Steve resist that?</p><p>So Steve leans down, capturing Tony’s lips for a chaste kiss before Tony tries to deepen it, to coax the man back to the warmth of their bed.</p><p>Something isn’t right. Steve has the worst case of morning breath Tony has ever–</p><p>He open his eyes, and Steve’s face is pallid and cold and his skin papery and thin, sloughing off his blackened, blood-wet flesh in pustular strings as Tony scrambles back, Steve’s bloated body falling on top of him. Tony is screaming as he tries to push off Steve’s corpse, but his hand goes through Steve’s rot-softened chest with a squelch. The smell is overwhelming, assaulting his nose, his mouth, the foul stench choking the very life from him. And Steve’s eyes – cloudy, bloodshot and unseeing – are open and looking straight through him.</p><p>And Tony <em>screams-screams-screams</em>, until the weight is off him, and Natasha is inexplicably crouched in front, shaking him until all he sees is her.</p><p>“Tony, I’m going to need you to focus. You need to–” but Natasha falls away from him, like sand in an hourglass as his world shutters and groans, splitting at the seams and dumping him into yet another nightmare.</p><p>Tony curls into himself and closes his eyes, concentrates on feeling nothing, doing nothing, experiencing nothing. He won’t do this anymore. He can’t.</p><p>Nothing makes sense. Tony needs–</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Someone has to do it.</p><p>One of them has to return the stones and Mjolnir to their original timelines. So Steve volunteers and goes over the plan with Bruce, further debriefing with the others to determine the exact circumstances and origin of the stones they collected. Clint’s story had been the most difficult to both tell and hear as the man relates his last fight with Natasha and her sacrifice to obtain the Soul Stone. <em>They don’t trade lives,</em> Steve had said once, but Natasha had proven more practical in the end. It had been her choice, as it had been Tony’s, and now…</p><p>Steve tells Bucky his decision first.</p><p>
  <strong>
    <em>Tells</em>
  </strong>
</p><p>Because it is not up for debate, not that Bucky doesn’t try.</p><p>“It’s crazy,” Bucky had argued. “Peggy has already lived her life. You can’t go back. What about her husband? Her children? Can you really keep quiet about HYDRA for <em>sixty years</em>? Steve. Be reasonable. You can’t shut up for five minutes to save your life,” he had pleaded to no avail.</p><p>But Steve had made up his mind. He was going to put down his shield and go home and try to be happy. It’s what Tony would have wanted, and nothing Bucky can say now will deter him.</p><p>In the end, Bucky’s shoulders slump. He looks at his best friend, knowing their days together are coming to a close, and asks, “Will this make you happy?”</p><p>Steve is honest with him; he owes him that much at least. “I don’t know, Bucky. Maybe? I only know I’m suffocating here. I can’t stay. Please don’t ask me to.”</p><p>Bucky sighs and claps him on the shoulder. “Then go. I won’t stop you.”</p><p>“One last thing,” Steve continues, not quite looking at Bucky. “The Avengers. They’re going to need a new leader, a new Captain America…”</p><p>“Hell no,” and Bucky is preemptively shaking his head in refusal. “You can become Mr. Carter all you want, but I’m not getting roped into–”</p><p>“I was thinking Sam would make the perfect replacement.”</p><p>“…Oh thank God. Don’t scare me like that, Stevie.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Bruce opens the stabilizing case, showing the six stones to Steve and Sam. “Now, remember… You have to return the stones to the exact moment you got them. Or you’re gonna open up a bunch of nasty alternative realities.”</p><p>Steve closes it, securing the lock, “Don’t worry, Bruce. Clip all the branches.”</p><p>“You know, I tried,” Bruce says, pausing a beat, letting himself feel the weight of his failure. “When I had the gauntlet, the stones, I really tried to bring her back.” He looks at Steve. “I miss them, man.”</p><p>“Me, too,” <em>and isn’t that the understatement of the century.</em></p><p>As they walk back towards Bucky, Sam offers, “You know if you want, I can come with you.”</p><p>“You’re a good man, Sam. This one’s on me, though,” Steve politely declines, coming to a stop a couple feet short of Bucky.</p><p>
  <em>It is time.</em>
</p><p>“Don’t do anything stupid ‘til I get back,” Steve tells him.</p><p>That inspires a chuckle. “How can I? You’re taking all the stupid with you.”</p><p>They embrace for the very last time.</p><p>“Gonna miss you, Buddy,” Bucky whispers, holding on for a touch longer than is necessary, committing the feel of Steve, the smell of his aftershave, to memory. It is hard to smile, but Steve seems happy for the first time in a long time.</p><p>“It’s gonna be okay, Buck,” he tells him, and he means it, too. The Avengers will take care of Bucky, he reminds himself. His best and oldest friend has always been the social butterfly, the endlessly adaptable one of the two of them. He won’t be alone; Sam (at the very least) won’t let him be.</p><p>Steve heads back towards the Quantum portal, donning the necessary suit.</p><p>He hears Sam ask Bruce, “How long is this gonna take?”</p><p>“For him? As long as he needs. For us? Five seconds,” Bruce replies, firing up the portal and setting the time stamp for the jump.</p><p>Steve steps onto the platform and picks up Mjolnir. It and the Reality Stone will be his first stop.</p><p>“Ready, Cap?” Bruce asks, registering Steve’s nod. “Alright. We’ll meet you back here, okay?”</p><p>“You bet,” Steve half-lies. He takes one last look at Bucky, at Sam and Bruce, his friends who he is choosing to possibly never see again. Because this is him being selfish.</p><p>For Tony.</p><p>Bruce counts down from his place behind the controls. “Going quantum. Three, two, one…”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>As planned, Steve first returns the Reality Stone and Mjolnir to Asgard circa 2013 mere seconds after Thor and Rocket had left on the eve of the Dark Elf insurrection. Queen Frigga trusts him due to his kinship with her son and his ability to wield Mjolnir. Steve is glad Thor is not here to see him. That would have sparked complex feelings of self-esteem and existentialism, of what it meant for Thor that another is worthy of his signature weapon. It would have also prompted a most-awkward conversation Steve wishes to avoid. He doesn’t have time (<em>liar</em>) for that.</p><p>His next stop is a two-fer: returning the Mind and Time Stones to New York circa 2012 on the day of the Chitauri invasion. There shouldn’t be any complications. Steve had knocked out his past self and past Tony should be in the hospital, having suffered what Tony had described as a mild heart attack. No one should be in the penthouse for when he returns the Mind Stone.</p><p>“Aren’t you supposed to be in medical? We found you passed out on the bridge,” Tony asks him, having come upon Steve in the ruined penthouse suite of Stark Tower. He cants his head to the side. “And what’s with the get up?”</p><p>“The same could be said for you,” Steve retorts. Of course he had underestimated Tony’s obstinacy. Since when has the man ever listened to medical advice and stayed in one place?</p><p>“Touché. How about we make a pact? You don’t tell Pepper, and I won’t tell…” Tony’s brows knit together, “Fury? Is that who passes as a life partner for you these days?”</p><p>“He’s my boss,” Steve says, his voice rough.</p><p>“Kinky.”</p><p>Steve doesn’t rise to the bait. Tony stands before him, alive and whole and just as annoying as he’s always been. He takes a step forward then another and another until he’s standing much too close.</p><p>Tony’s smile becomes a touch tight at the corners. “Um… Cap? Did they not have personal space in the forties?”</p><p>“Shut up,” Steve says, as he wraps his arms around Tony, pulling him into a warm embrace.</p><p>“Whoa. You must have hit your head a lot harder than we thought. You sure you don’t need medical?”</p><p>But Steve doesn’t let up. “Didn’t I tell you to shut up?” he says, burying his face into Tony’s shoulder. “I missed you,” he murmurs.</p><p>“Right. This is normal. This is how you greet a teammate you just met yesterday,” and now Tony is babbling, because Steve is still Captain America, and Tony has always had a little bit of a crush on Captain America.</p><p>“You almost died today.” <em>You </em>are<em> dead, eleven years from now,</em> he thinks. Eleven years, many of them wasted while they were busy being angry with each other. “I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry, Tony. I’m so sorry.” <em>You had so much to live for – an entire life – and it was all taken away from you with the snap of your fingers. </em></p><p>Now Tony is leaning away, patting him awkwardly on the shoulder. “Hey now… I saved everyone, and I managed not to die.”</p><p>
  <em>This time.</em>
</p><p>Steve reigns in his emotions and regains his composure. He can’t stay, as much as he’d like to. Besides, this isn’t his Tony, not really. His Tony is dead.</p><p>“Yeah… I guess I should go back, you know? It’s just… I got this from the S.H.I.E.L.D. guys,” Steve hands him the Mind Stone. “I think you should hold onto it. I don’t know if we can trust them.” Perhaps he can do just this. Small hints. A push in the right direction. What’s the harm?</p><p>“Huh. Suddenly you’re on Team Fury-is-shady?”</p><p>“Not Fury necessarily, but… I don’t know, with the whole weapons thing you uncovered… Maybe the safest hands are our own.”</p><p>Who is he kidding? Bucky was right; Steve can’t keep his trap shut if the fate of the entire future depended on it (and it just might).</p><p>“Alright, if you say so,” Tony transfers the Mind Stone to a containment cell as Steve turns to leave.</p><p>He looks over his shoulder to take one final look at Tony, only to find the man staring hotly at his ass. “Um, you mind?”</p><p>“Hm?” Tony looks up at his face, schooling his features to neutrality. “Can you blame me? Whichever bureaucratic bean counter designed your new suit is an artist. Your ass looks fantastic.”</p><p>Tony had designed his new suit.</p><p>“No one told you to look, Tony,” Steve says, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.</p><p>“I’m only human, Cap.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Steve’s next stop is the abode of the Ancient One, Dr. Strange’s mentor of the Mystic Arts, approximately fifteen blocks away.</p><p>“You are five minutes late,” The Ancient One states when Steve opens the door to the roof, having taken the stairs two at a time to make up for the time lost from his unexpected rendezvous with Tony.</p><p>“Sorry, I got a little side-tracked,” Steve says by way of an explanation, handing her the Time Stone which she deposits back into the Eye of Agamotto.</p><p>“It’s difficult, is it not?” she comments, closing up the Eye with a wave of her hand. “You see the mistakes of your past and wish to correct them?”</p><p>But Steve has his own questions. “You can see all of time. That’s your deal, right?”</p><p>“I can see up to five years, four months, eight days, thirteen hours, fifty-two minutes, sixteen seconds into the future, but no farther than that. I’m afraid my sight is clouded after that point. One never sees beyond one’s own death.”</p><p>“…I’m sorry,” because what do you say to that?</p><p>“It is a good death.”</p><p>If she can’t see beyond five-odd years… “So you don’t know. You don’t see what’s coming for us in the future.”</p><p>The Ancient One seems almost weary. “I’ve prevented countless terrible futures, and after each one, there’s always another. I can see each of them up to the point of my death but no farther.”</p><p>“Then what’s the point? If there’s always something worse on the horizon, how can we ever stop, ever rest?” How will Steve ever hang up the mantle – fulfill Tony’s last wish – if they’re always on the verge of disaster?</p><p>But she only looks at him, her head canted to the side in consideration. “You have lost someone. Someone important.”</p><p>“I thought you couldn’t see the future.”</p><p>“You don’t need to see the future to see the loss clear on your face,” The Ancient One’s eyes bore into him. “You grieve, even now, for your lost companion, the other half of your soul.”</p><p>
  <em>The other half of his what?</em>
</p><p>Steve waves off her assertion. “With all due respect, you’re way off.”</p><p>“Perhaps. Perhaps not, but in answer to your question: When I die, I will pass the mantle of Sorcerer Supreme unto Dr. Stephen Strange,” The Ancient One looks off to the east, where Dr. Strange is operating on a patient, five-ish years before fate comes knocking. “I do not know what lies in his future, but I sense he will be the best among us. He has great potential if only he can put aside his arrogance and fear.” She turns back to Steve.  “Have you picked a successor?”</p><p>He thinks of Sam, the next Captain America if Steve has any say in it. “…Yes.”</p><p>“And you trust them? You believe they will be the very best?”</p><p>“Of course.”</p><p>“Then you have fulfilled your duty to the future,” she declares. “They will carry on in your stead, thwarting all manner of evil that comes their way.”</p><p>Steve can be done, if he wants. It’s what he told Bucky he’d do before embarking on this assignment. He will do this one last mission then retire to 1945 to settle down with Peggy, to have a quiet life where he knows everything will work out for the best, without his interference. But could he do it? Really? Hang up his shield, close his eyes, and let the world continue forth with its countless injustices, let it descend into chaos, let HYDRA take over Peggy’s life’s work without a word of the cancer that has infected the very heart of her agency? Sit on the sidelines as Martin Luther King Jr. and President Kennedy are assassinated? Let Bucky languish in a HYDRA facility for decades?</p><p>Could he really just let history happen unchanged?</p><p>And would it really be worth it?</p><p>“I have a favor to ask if I may,” Steve says.</p><p>“You may ask, but I may choose not to grant it.”</p><p>“Fair enough,” Steve looks away, scratching the back of his neck. “I am at a sort of… crossroads, I guess. I want to see one possibility before I commit to it permanently. I would like you to use the Time Stone to transport me back to the Stork Club on April 14, 1945, at 8:00.”</p><p>“That is very specific.”</p><p>“I had a date.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>To his surprise, Peggy is at the Stork Club, waiting for a dead man.</p><p>And to Peggy’s surprise, that dead man actually shows up.</p><p>“How?” She asks, delicate hand over her mouth, eyes wide as if she’s seeing a ghost.</p><p>Steve takes her in his arms, proving he is solid and here and alive. “Would you believe magic?”</p><p>And now she’s laughing, her eyes shining. “I would believe anything is possible at this point.”</p><p>So Steve takes her hand and leads her to the dance floor. The band is playing something slow, as he had always pictured. He considers staying, using the remaining Pym particles to return to this exact moment, after he returns the final stone.</p><p>“It seems you’ve also learned to dance,” Peggy murmurs against his chest.</p><p>Steve freezes.</p><p><em>I can’t believe you can’t dance, Cap,</em> Tony whispers from the depths of his memory. <em>Let me show you…</em></p><p>“Steve?”</p><p>“It’s nothing.” Steve picks up on the rhythm, swaying with Peggy to the music. He could pick up his life from here just like this. It will be as if he had never left, his second chance at a simple life, with Peggy.</p><p>“Where did you go just now?” she asks, because Peggy has always been perceptive.</p><p>“I was thinking… After this, I have one more stop, and then I’ll be able to come back. Permanently,” he tells her. “Would you… would you like that?” Steve would like that. Perhaps he can live here, forget about the future, forget about Tony’s death which is still seventy-eight years from now. It hasn’t happened here, not yet. Tony will be born, will live and fall in love and find meaning–</p><p>And die all over again.</p><p>Because the Avengers had split up and couldn’t stop the looming threat.</p><p>Because Tony and Steve couldn’t agree on governmental oversight.</p><p>Because Steve no longer trusted the integrity of government agencies due to HYDRA’s infiltration of S.H.I.E.L.D., and Tony no longer trusted himself due to his creation of Ultron.</p><p>Could Steve really sit back and let it all happen again?</p><p>“What do you say, Peg?”</p><p>The song ends, and Peggy leads him back to the periphery. “How long has it been for you?” she asks, looking him directly in the eye.</p><p>“What do you mean?”</p><p>“Howard hasn’t found you yet, and you’re older than last I saw you,” she states, her voice frank. “You still look amazing, Steve, but… you’re different.”</p><p>Steve has never lied to Peggy, and he’s not about to start now. “He doesn’t find me. I sleep like Rip Van Winkle for almost seventy years. I’ve been awake for twelve. And… something bad happened, but we fixed it, and– and I have a chance to come back, to live my life right the second time around.” He can live here. He can forget. He can have this.</p><p>Can’t he?</p><p>Peggy is still looking at him with piercing dark eyes. She’s staring right through him, and Steve is surprised that he is afraid of what she will find.</p><p>“…I know the difference between a man running away from something and a man running towards something,” she finally says, “And this isn’t the latter.”</p><p>Peggy knows. She knows because she has always been smart, could always read Steve like a book. Peggy will always be his best gal.</p><p>“You’re going to have a wonderful life, Peg,” he tells her, because she deserves to know. “I’m glad we could finally have our last dance.”</p><p>And now her eyes are shining, and she’s struggling to smile. “Take care of yourself, Steve,” she says, pulling him into a tight embrace.</p><p>Peggy will be okay. She will get married, have children and grandchildren, grow old and see Steve again. His past. Her future. Like ships passing in the night.</p><p>“Goodbye, Peg.”</p><p>And with that, he walks out of the Stork Club where the Ancient One is waiting to transport him back to the New York Sanctum in 2012.</p><p>“Did you get your answer?” she asks.</p><p>“Sort of,” but what should Steve do now?</p><p>“If I may Captain Rogers, as a protector against mystical threats, I have some insight into the spiritual realm. I see your friend there now, the one you visited before me,” she says, idly paging through an old tome on the table beside them.</p><p>“Tony? That’s impossible. His death is too far into the future. You shouldn’t be able to see him there.”</p><p>“Time can be strange on other planes of existence. It’s not the same as we experience here, but even so, your friend’s timeline is even stranger,” she states. Her hand stills, and she quickly skims through the passage as if to confirm something she already knows. “To speak plainly, I am concerned for him.”</p><p>“He’s dead.”</p><p>She looks over at him, meeting his eyes. “Yes, but the essence of what was Anthony Edward Stark – what you would call the soul – is splintered across different planes, fractured across time and space. Bits of him flitting in and out… I have never seen the like of it before,” she admits. “Death is not usually so violent as this, transcending the physical body to leave its imprint on his essence. His injuries are of a spiritual nature, and he needs a functional template, his other half, to see him through the void, to stitch him back together and mend the fabric of his own tattered soul.”</p><p>“You mean Pepper? How can she help him?”</p><p>The Ancient One simply stares at Steve, her expression flat. “He requires assistance from his <em>soulmate</em>,” she reiterates.</p><p><em>Your lost companion, the other half of your soul</em>.</p><p>“…And you think that’s me.”</p><p>“You will find Anthony Edward Stark in the Soul Realm at the end of your journey,” she says in lieu of a direct response. “At a crossroads. It is your choice, Captain Rogers.”</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Three stones left: The Space, Power and Soul Stones.</p><p>The last two are in 2014, one on Vormir and another on Morag. Steve needs the Space stone to travel between the two, so that will have to be returned last.</p><p>He transports himself to Morag first, carefully containing the Power Stone inside an ancient orb and placing it atop an unconscious Peter Quill. Rocket had been <em>very</em> specific as to the time and place Steve needed to deliver the stone. Considering the minutes Quill will spend unconscious, he needs the orb in hand before someone called Korag catches up to him.</p><p>With another stone delivered to its rightful place, Steve uses the Space Stone to teleport to Vormir, the entrance of the Soul Realm overseen by his old nemesis, Red Skull.</p><p>He stumbles a bit on the landing, disoriented from the journey. He wonders if this is what the BiFrost feels like.</p><p>“Welcome, Steven, son of–” Red Skull stops, staring at his new charge. “Son of a whore. What are you doing here?”</p><p>Luckily, Clint had prepared him for such an eventuality.</p><p>“Schmidt,” Steve says through grit teeth. “You haven’t aged a day.”</p><p>“As have you,” Red Skull shoots back. “You are not here for the Soul Stone. I see you have it in that case you carry.”</p><p>“I’d like to return it.”</p><p>He nods. “Very well, but you will get nothing for your trouble. It was an everlasting exchange. A soul for a soul, and even if you seek to return that for which you have bargained, I’m afraid the trade cannot be undone.”</p><p>“I’d like to see them first.”</p><p>Red Skull pauses, considering the request. “…That could be arranged, but whatever you are planning, you should know: One must stay, and one must return. There is nothing I can offer you beyond that.”</p><p>“Like you would do anything to help me.” Steve can barely stand to be in Red Skull’s presence for two minutes without punching him, and he is reaching his limit, so the sooner they do this…</p><p>“You misunderstand me, Steven, son of Joseph. I no longer seek power or glory,” the man (the spirit?) claims as he floats by, showing Steve up the cliff. “I am simply a guide to others who seek a treasure I cannot possess.”</p><p>“So, how do I go about this… return?”</p><p>“Cast the Soul Stone over the edge. You will awaken in the Soul Realm, but remember: Only one of you can return. Choose wisely.”</p><p>So Steve does just that. He flings the cursed stone over the precipice, watching it arc then fall onto the runes below.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>He wakes up in a barren landscape under a red-tinged sky. He stands, rubbing his temple as he spies Natasha, seemingly alive and well (but he knows better). She’s hovering over and softly speaking to a quivering man, gaunt and burnt and broken, curled up into the fetal position. His body fritzes and shutters, like a bad transmission or the eroded picture of an old VHS tape that is nearing the end of its life.</p><p>
  <em>Tony.</em>
</p><p>Steve rushes over, kneeling down by Natasha.</p><p>“Steve! What–”</p><p>“I’m on Vormir. No time to explain. What the hell happened to Tony?” he reaches out, wanting to soothe the man.</p><p>“No!” Natasha tries to stop him, but Steve’s hand is already on Tony’s elbow, inspiring a soft glow at the point of contact. “Okay… that’s never happened before,” she says, perplexed.</p><p>“What usually happens?”</p><p>“He fades away,” She looks over at Steve, alarm clear in her face. “I don’t understand what’s wrong with him. He keeps phasing in and out, going to different times, different places, and by the time I catch up, he’s already…” she doesn’t finish. The effects are clear.</p><p>Tony keens, high and wordless. His eyes are open but unseeing, any power, any presence he had while alive sapped.</p><p>“He used the stones himself to save everyone, to get rid of Thanos’s army and prevent universal genocide. Tony used the stones and now his soul… it’s splintered.”</p><p>“How do we help him?”</p><p>Steve is silent for a beat. It’s his decision, but there’s only one viable path forward he can see. “Only one of us can return, and I think it should be you.”</p><p>“No,” Nat says. “There has to be another way. Time has no meaning here; we can figure it out. I’m not letting you die here.” Because she is smart enough to know that is exactly what Steve is suggesting.</p><p>“There is no other way. One of us has to stay, and– and they need you, Nat, and Tony needs me.” Steve stands to slough off his shield. “Take it. Make sure it gets to Sam.” He holds it for a moment, feeling the heft and balance of his signature weapon for the very last time before passing it to Nat. “I’ll stay with him.”</p><p>“Steve–”</p><p>“Go Natasha. The coordinates are in this,” He undoes his time-space GPS, handing it to her as well along with the remaining Pym particles. “When you leave, you’ll wake up in a lake on Vormir. Use this to return the Space stone to Camp Lehigh in 1970.” Now, he’s unzipping his Quantum suit and passing it to her.</p><p>“1970?” she repeats.</p><p>“1970. It’s in the GPS,” he confirms, clasping a firm hand, strong and steady, on her shoulder. “And then go home.”</p><p>“You sure about this?”</p><p>“Never been surer of anything in my life. So go. I’m fine with this. Really.”</p><p>Nat fastens Steve’s device onto her own wrist, drapes the suit over one arm and holds on tightly to the leather strap of his shield. “Goodbye, Steve.”</p><p>“Goodbye, Nat. Tell Bucky… tell the others… well, tell them that Tony and I are fine,” Steve says, gracing her with a rueful smile. “Things worked out exactly the way they’re supposed to, and we’re going to be okay.” He steps back. “Time is funny here, but I guess you’ll be taking the long way around this time, so… See you in a minute.”</p><p>“…Thank you.”</p><p>And with a final nod, Steve turns back towards Tony, still lost and confused, crouched over, scratching absently at his hair, mumbling to himself and scrabbling fingers over his armor in a way that fails to soothe him. Steve kneels before this broken man, taking him into his arms. “Shhh… Tony, I’m here now. I’m here, and I’m never leaving you.”</p><p>Tony finally registers the identity of his new companion in a rare moment of clarity. “Steve?” he says, clinging to Steve, tears running down his cheeks. “Oh God, Steve, is it really you?”</p><p>“Yes, Tony.”</p><p>Natasha fades away, disappearing into the realm of the living as the two left behind begin to glow from within, the light pulsing in time with their shared heart beats and expanding outward.</p><p>“I- I think I made the wrong choice,” Tony admits, his voice rough and shaking. “I’m scared, Steve. I’m scared. Please don’t go.”</p><p>“I’m staying,” Steve says, holding him as scenes from their lives swirl around them. There’s Howard Stark as Steve knew him, debonair smile and dashing demeanor, alongside one much colder, outsized and forbidding. He reaches out for Tony, who shrinks away from large fingers looking to bruise him. Tony clutches tightly to Steve, almost afraid he will disappear. But Steve doesn’t.</p><p>“Get off of him!” he cries, reaching out to knock the outstretched hands away.</p><p>“Steve, no!” Tony tries to stop him, afraid that any attempt on Steve’s part to interact with the monsters will cause him to evaporate, to melt away into the ether like Natasha had. He doesn’t know how he will bear it if Steve was to leave him now.</p><p>But Steve’s touch remains solid as he beats back the beast and returns to his charge. “You’re safe, Tony. I won’t let them have you.”</p><p>Their world tilts, and they tumble down across the wreckage. Their team, the Avengers lie amongst the rubble, bodies mangled and blood pooling beneath them, their eyes sunken and faces frozen in screams. Tony can hear them even now, and he presses his palms to his ears to keep out the intolerable noise. The Chitauri cloud the post-apocalyptic sky, grey and ashen from the blast that should have taken out New York. Tony trembles, rocking in place.</p><p><em>My fault. My fault. My fault</em> is the soft refrain.</p><p>“No, Tony. No… this isn’t real. It’s not.”</p><p>“I couldn’t save them,” and Tony looks haunted, like Cassandra of Troy. “I couldn’t save you.”</p><p>
  <em>We weren’t ready. I didn’t give enough.</em>
</p><p>“We’ve all done things we regret, and you can’t save everyone, but you saved us. You saved us all,” Steve assures him, cradling Tony to his chest to hide his face. There are shimmers, tendrils of light that burn away the Chitauri and melt the dead away, leaving the sky a clear blue.</p><p>Tony blinks rapidly, his body seizing, and now they’re in a lab, the metal sarcophagus of Steve’s rebirth gleaming, but it’s also a dark cave and there’s a rudimentary suit lying half-complete on the table. A man – maybe Dr. Erskine, maybe Ho Yinsen – is keeled over, bleeding. One man dies so another can live.</p><p>“It’s my fault,” Tony croaks out, crouched low. “He died. He died, and then it was only me.”</p><p>“They made a choice to save us,” Steve says gently, and the figure who may be either of their mentors stands and shuffles over, the blood receding back into the wound and closing up as the color returns to his face. “I’d like to think they didn’t die in vain, that they are satisfied by what we did with what they gave us.”</p><p>Steve doesn’t know how long they phase between worlds, but with every memory, every demon and nightmare and insecurity, revisited and conquered and put to rest, the fingers of Tony’s right hand – stiff since he appeared in this world – loosen and regain full range. The skin of his face feels more elastic, as it had been in life. Steve is there every step of the way to stand with Tony and comfort him, their memories bleeding together until it’s a kaleidoscope, the familiar and unfamiliar shifting and changing and mirroring the other until it is difficult to tell where one began and another ended.</p><p>And through it all, Steve’s presence is constant, never leaving Tony as they glitch between planes of existence, though the frequency of such fractures becomes less as they seemingly stabilize.</p><p>Until it’s just the two of them under a reddish-orange sky.</p><p>Tony’s eyes are clear, his gaze steady and trained on Steve. “I love you.” <em>It’s too late now, but maybe it’s always been too late for us.</em></p><p>Steve simply smiles. “It’s not too late, Tony,” and that’s when Tony realizes Steve can hear him, even if he never spoke the words aloud, “and I love you, too.”</p><p>
  <em>I’ve always loved you. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>I’m sorry I never told you before.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I’m sorry you died.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>I’m sorry I was afraid, but I’m not anymore.</em>
</p><p>Neither of them knows who originates the sentiments now; both feeling as though they are speaking and listening simultaneously. And so as they embrace, their worlds, their histories, collapse around them, melding and blending and becoming one – past, present, and possible futures across a multiverse of possibility – and they glow brighter with every pulse, until all that is left is the blinding light of a single soul, complete and whole.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>Bruce counts down the seconds to Steve’s return. “And returning in five, four, three, two, one…”</p><p>Natasha materializes on the pad in Steve’s stead, wearing his baggy, oversized Quantum suit and holding his shield.</p><p>Even Bucky is stunned by the development.</p><p>She waves. “Hey boys. Missed me?”</p><p>And that seems to break the spell. Bruce sidesteps the console, hurrying to the platform to meet Natasha, embracing her tightly with his good arm. Then Sam and Bucky join in, wanting to touch her arms, her back, across her shoulder, make sure she’s really here.</p><p>“But… how?” Bruce says.</p><p>“And where’s Steve?” Sam adds. “Don’t tell me that madman messed with the time stream. I knew I should have gone with him,” before settling on: “It was magic, right?”</p><p>But the look on Natasha’s face when they step back to give her space sobers them all.</p><p>“He was happy when I left, and Tony… I think Steve is the only one who can help him,” she says after a moment’s consideration. “Steve wanted– he wanted me to tell you all that he and Tony are going to be okay, that everything worked out, and he’ll see us soon.”</p><p>“Do you really believe that, Nat?” Bucky interjects.</p><p>She seems pensive for a bit, then replies, her voice firm and unwavering, “Yes. Yes, I do.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This is a remix of Padraigen’s “This Terribly Tempered Soul.” I’ve read a few of their wonderful stories, but this is the one that really stuck with me, particularly the bittersweet ambiguous ending where Steve and Tony find each other again. It’s criminally underrated, so if you enjoyed this, please check out the original and give it some love.</p><p>This was an experimental fic where every cut scene between Steve and Tony flowed into the next as I tried to exemplify their soulmate connection by stitching their experiences together with the themes in each subsequent scene and/or split-sentence cuts, kind of a “Miss Susie Had a Steamboat”-style writing. I felt that it was similar to how the original organized its scenes, so I carried it over and tried to emphasize their connection with a different writing style. Let me know if you liked it in the comments below :)</p></blockquote></div></div>
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